It Was Never Meant To Be
by LikeASociopath
Summary: Maybe in another universe, they can be together. [Sherlock/Molly (unrequited), Sherlock/John.]


This is written for **Let's Write Sherlock Challenge 15: Trope Bingo **on Tumblr.

Bingo Card Number: 2

Trope: Jealousy

Many thanks to my amazing beta **Alicia** and **Kay** for making this work readable :)

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><p>Her mother once told her, that the heart knows what the mind doesn't.<p>

She'd immediately dismissed it as a biologically invalid statement. The human heart and mind are two different things. The human heart has no cognitive function like the brain; it only works to pump blood throughout the body.

Her mother just gave her a gentle smile, and told her she would understand it when she got older.

The heart is the first organ to be formed in a growing body. Once it is anatomically completed, it sends blood to developing cells and stimulates growth.

The brain is arguably the second most important organ in a human. It provides cognitive function, and it is what defines us as individuals and gives us the ability to feel.

_Specialist Registrar._ That was her job title.

Looking down at the badge and access card given to her by the helpful receptionist, she was rather proud of herself.

Molly didn't have many friends, but she was fine with that. She liked her job, and she knew what came with it.

Her father had passed away when she was seven. She couldn't remember many things about him, but the one thing that steadfastly lodged in her mind was how he told her bedtime stories every night.

Time passed, memories faded, but her love for storytelling stayed firm.

And that was exactly what she was doing now, only the role had been reversed – with her being the storyteller, for the dead.

She met Sherlock Holmes for the first time during her third month working in St. Bart's.

Sherlock was like no one she'd ever met before. With just one glance, he'd deduced her past, her family, and her cat. He was a maelstrom, a whirlpool of genius and mind too advanced for others to follow. He was a force to be reckoned with, in spite of his rudeness and eccentricity, and you could never be prepared for dealing with him.

He was brilliant. He was so brilliant that sometime Molly thought about what it would be like to have a mind that never rested.

She liked being alone, but she hated being lonely.

The dead bodies were her constant companions. They were quiet; they never judged, and they gave her the space she needed to think.

But sometimes, it wasn't enough. She knew that she wasn't particularly attractive or interesting, and that people tended to overlook her.

So she continued to do Sherlock Holmes favours and allowed him to conduct experiments that she'd never heard of.

Sometimes, Molly observed. She knew she could never be as observant as him but she did gain the knowledge of how he took his coffee, how his eyes brightened in the wake of a challenge and how his jaw ticked when he was annoyed. She also knew that he didn't sleep much, or eat much; that he considered his body to be a transport for his mind: nothing more, nothing less.

Sometimes, she allowed the constant rejections to get to her. She wanted to be angry with him, but a smile and a simple utterance of _please_, and her walls crumbled.

She knew a lot of things about him, but she never understood his heart.

Afferent neurons receive signals from our sensory organs and send them to the brain; efferent neurons send the information from the brain to our effectors to produce proper responses. The brain collects, interprets, and catalogues every sensory signal from the body, teaching us how to react to the outer world.

But the human heart, despite being a muscular organ, has its own way of telling the brain what it feels too.

Metaphorically, psychologists think that the heart has a brain in itself. That human actually possess a heart-brain that is composed of about 40,000 neurons that allow us to sense and feel.

They say the heart is wise, that letting it guide us will lead to happiness and fulfilment.

The first time they have sex is after a particularly nasty case.

It was a child abduction case, and Sherlock was called in to assist. They caught the abductor, of course. But it was already too late. The six years old girl's body was found in the Thames, with evidence of torture and sexual assault before she died.

Molly didn't know what was harder to take, examining the girl's cold body on the steel slab or witnessing the devastated looks of her parents when they identified the body.

She wanted to cry, but she didn't. She'd stopped crying a long time ago, ever since her father's funeral and her mother's descent into depression.

Her fingers shook when she opened the door to her flat. She wanted a hot shower and a cuddle with her cat.

She hung her coat on the rack. She turned around, and saw Sherlock Holmes sitting on her couch, his gaze tracking her every move.

"Sherlock?"

"You should change your door lock."

Molly sighed. "If you want access to the lab you'll have to wait until the morning. I'm off my shift."

"Don't be obtuse, Molly. It is unappealing."

"Please, Sherlock. I – I need to be alone right now." She ran a hand through her chestnut curls. "Please."

Sherlock stood up from the chair and walked towards her. "Do you?"

"What?"

"You heard me the first time. Do you really want to be alone, right now?"

Sherlock was standing much closer than he had been before, and Molly could see how the light played off the flecks of gold in his beautiful ocean-coloured eyes. It was different. He seemed different. The coldness had faded and Molly thought that there was something vulnerable in his eyes.

She saw the way his eyes flickered, the way his jaw clenched and relaxed, and she knew why.

She lifted a hand to cup the side of his face, "Sherlock."

And suddenly, his lips were on hers. It was hot and desperate; there was nothing sweet about it.

Molly slid her hands up his back, and moaned when she felt him unbutton her shirt, felt him harden against her stomach.

His hands wrapped around her waist possessively, and they stumbled through into her bedroom, tearing off clothes as they went. He rolled onto her hastily when they fell onto her bed, his hips grinding against hers as he mouthed at her neck, sucking and biting as she whimpered breathlessly beneath him.

She moved her hands down his torso, easily finding his hard, velvety length. She felt him gasp against her throat as she continued stroking his cock, teasing the head with her thumb every once in a while.

He nipped at her pulse point before moving down to her chest; his devious tongue darted out and licked one pebbled nipple before sucking it into his mouth. Molly groaned loudly at the ministration and pressed her head back into the pillow, hoping it would muffle her voice.

She tangled her hand in his hair, her voice breathless and hoarse with lust. "Sher – Sherlock."

He stopped what he was doing and looked up at her, eyes searching her face. "Do you want to stop, Molly?"

He was giving her a way out. If she said yes, he would leave and they would never speak of it again.

But it'd been too long for her. She wanted it. She wanted him.

"No."

Then he was back on her, parting her legs and dropping his head down to the growing wetness between thighs. She let out an embarrassed squeak at the first touch of his tongue to her folds, and she felt him smirk. Soon, he was greedily lapping at her, his tongue darting in and out as his fingers massaged at her clit. She keened and thrashed on top of her duvet as the stimulation started to become too much.

All too soon, he had her arching her back; the orgasm swept through her in a powerful wave of pleasure.

He moved to open the top drawer of her nightstand and took out a condom. He rolled it onto himself before moving into a kneeling position in between her legs.

"Molly."

She looked at him. "Y-Yes."

He lifted her easily, hands cradling her arse as the head of his cock nudged gently against her still sensitive clit. He positioned his thick length at her entrance and waited for her to give the nod when she was ready.

Then he plunged into her, and it was glorious. He bent down to suck hungrily at her neck just above her pulse point as he rocked into her, hard and fast. She gasped and bucked, locking her legs tightly around his hips, feeling the approaching pleasure of a second orgasm.

The wet heat around him was maddening. He sped up, his hands coming up to toy with her swollen nipples, drawing a loud groan from Molly.

It was hot and intense and it wasn't long before she was crying out and digging her fingernails into his back. Likewise, the tightening of her muscles around him caused his thrusts to become erratic. He pounded into her until he too was coming.

The air in the bedroom was thick with sex and neither of them spoke for a few breathless minutes. When her breathing calmed, she turned to him only to realise he'd fallen asleep. The case must have affected him more than he let on.

She looked at him closely, her brown eyes taking in every detail on his face and body, savouring the quiet moment in which she could really look at him and not get any disparaging comment in return. He looked peaceful in his sleep; sex had given him the momentary reprieve he needed from his mind.

Taking one last look at the consulting detective, she switched off the lights and covered them with the duvet before falling asleep next to the reassuring warmth of another body.

When she woke up alone, she understood that nothing had changed. The previous night was just a product of two people trying to find comfort in each other.

She missed the first meeting of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson, but she got to meet the ex-army doctor five days after he moved into 221B Baker Street.

She'd seen the way they worked together. She'd seen the way they seemed to communicate by just meeting the other's eyes, and the way they moved around in perfect sync as if they'd known each other for a long time.

There was an easy camaraderie between them that had never existed for Sherlock and herself, the sort of companionship that she yearned to have with the consulting detective.

Somehow, in her own lab, she felt like an intruder.

Molly learned that you don't really need to know someone well to be jealous of them.

There was a phantom pain in her chest whenever she saw Sherlock smiling at John. It was irrational, she knew. Sherlock was never hers. The intense, unpleasant feeling she had towards the innocent doctor was not right. He didn't do anything wrong.

She understood.

But she couldn't get the pain to go away.

Watching Sherlock looking at John with such adoration hurt. Sherlock had always taken her for granted, using her to gain access to the morgue, always demanding her to run tests for him when she didn't need to, and always asking for body parts for his experiments. She complied every time.

She'd fancied the thought that she meant something to him, at the very least. She thought he'd come to see her as a friend. But it was not the case.

She didn't count.

She was nothing in his eyes.

Gathering up the remnants of her pride, she started to look elsewhere.

Few months later, she met Moriarty, the murderous psychopath who just used her to get to Sherlock.

She thought she should probably stop trying.

"_You're wrong, you know. You do count. You've always counted and I've always trusted you. But you were right. I'm not okay."_

It should feel good, hearing the words you'd yearned for so long, the token of recognition from the man you loved. It should be magnificent.

But it was not.

If she knew the cost of those words would be so deadly, she would never have wished to hear them at all.

"_Molly, I think I'm going to die."_

"_What do you need?"_

"_If I wasn't everything that you think I am, everything that I think I am, would you still want to help me?"_

"_What do you need?"_

"_You."_

The death of one for the lives of three. She'd helped him, of course.

Sherlock Holmes was an amazing kisser. His lips were warm and insistent as he pressed them hungrily against hers; his hands pressed her against the wall, crowding her with every inch of his lean body.

A part of her mind – the part that somehow managed to retain the ability to think – asked what they were doing. Molly didn't fool herself into thinking that it was because he had feelings for her. He'd said that she counted, so he must've at least like her well enough, maybe even consider her a friend. But she knew that he didn't care about her the way she wanted him to.

When Sherlock pulled back from her and searched her face, she knew he understood, and he was giving her an exit.

Molly wished that she was strong enough to take it. Otherwise, she would risk losing her heart forever to this man who would never love her back.

But it had been a long time since someone touched her like this, and standing in front of her was the most gorgeous man she had ever seen, a man she had loved for years and a man she would risk everything to save.

He would leave London any day now, and she might never see him again.

Making up her mind, she tipped her head back and pressed up against him, pouring her feelings for him into the kiss they shared.

_John didn't know that Sherlock loved him. And Sherlock might never have the chance to say it._

When he put his hands on her arse, pressing her even closer, she banished from her mind the knowledge that she was just a replacement, and all of this was merely a projection of what Sherlock felt for his doctor.

At the moment, they were just two lonely people trying to find solace in each other's arms. And she prayed everyday that he would come back safe.

_The heart knows what the mind doesn't._

Her mind knew that her love for Sherlock wasn't healthy. She could live with it, but it was consuming her.

Could she get her heart to understand it too?

She had an engagement ring on her finger.

They'd met through friends. Tom was sweet and a little bit shy. He worked as an accountant and didn't mind her job, unlike the others she'd met. They'd moved in together after five months, and he proposed to her after a year. They'd adopted a dog, and she'd met his family.

It was nice to have someone who didn't overlook her.

It was normal.

Three years. He was gone for three years.

She received no word from him about his homecoming. In fact, she found out that he was still alive with the rest of the world. She saw him on the news, standing in a conference room full of reporters with John standing sturdily at his side.

Of course, it was only right that he told John first.

The next time she saw Sherlock, it had been a month since the news. Tom was visiting his family at the country and she found the newly reinstated consulting detective standing at her kitchen doorway when she came home from the morgue.

It'd been three years, and he looked different. He was thinner than before, all bone and muscle; his face was more lined, more worn and gaunt; eyes once bright were dulled by sadness and unspeakable experience.

Seeing the man like this, Molly didn't know what to feel. This wasn't the Sherlock she'd known years ago, standing here was a man who'd sacrificed and suffered to save the lives of people he held dear.

His eyes flickered to her hand when she took off the gloves. "You're engaged."

"Yes, Sherlock. It's what normal people do, yeah? Move on with their lives?"

She immediately regretted her response when she saw him flinch at her words.

"Sorry. Sorry, that was uncalled for." She ran a hand through her hair, one her nervous ticks that she'd never gotten rid of. "Why are you here, Sherlock?"

"Did I do the right thing, Molly?" He spoke quietly, eyes clouded with emotions she couldn't decipher.

"Doing what?"

"Coming back."

"Of course, Sherlock! What are you talking about?" Worried, she moved towards him and put a comforting hand on his arm.

"It's different. Everything is different."

Molly gently steered him to the living room, made him sit on the couch and moved to sit on the coffee table opposite him. "It's John, isn't it?"

"We still live together and he still goes on cases with me. I thought everything would be the same but it isn't. Every day, I sit in the living room with the same wallpaper and the same chairs, but I feel as though I'm not back in London, that the flat isn't the flat anymore and that I have a different flatmate who is not the John Watson I know." Molly could see that he was angry with himself, his hands clenched so tightly during the entire speech that his knuckles turned white by the sheer force of it.

It was as though he was trying to hold onto something that wasn't there.

Sherlock looked down when she put her hands on top of his. He didn't unclench his but he didn't shake hers off either, so she left them there.

Silence reigned for a few minutes before he spoke again. "He's very angry with me, Molly. He doesn't want to show it but he is. We argue everyday, from morning to night, about the smallest thing to just everything else. But we can't do anything to stop it." He paused and let out a self-deprecating laugh, "And I thought being away was the hardest part."

"Oh, Sherlock…"

"Don't." Sherlock snapped, "I don't want your pity, Molly."

She looked away from him, hiding the disappointment in her eyes. He never really could see her. She couldn't say that she was surprised, but it hurt nonetheless.

"You don't see it, do you?"

"See what?" He looked at her sharply but Molly's gaze was focused on the wall beside her. She didn't speak for a few moments, but when she did, she turned to look him in the eyes.

"Am I your friend, Sherlock?"

He stared at her with a strange expression. "I told you before, Molly. You do count."

She felt her breath catch, and worked to swallow the thickness that suddenly clogged in her throat. When she spoke again, she was glad that her voice was calm. "Then trust me, okay? Talk to him. Tell him what you've been through in the last three years. He deserves to know."

When he fell asleep on the couch, she covered him with a blanket and moved her hand through his dark curls, like she'd done years ago. The texture was just as she remembered, thick and soft.

She could feel the burning behind her eyes, and the whirlwind of emotions that was threatening to choke her. It would be so easy to simply bend down and press her lips against his. To wake him up with her kiss and tell him what she felt.

But she did nothing. Instead, she took a deep breath and turned away.

Between the left and the right heart is a dividing wall of muscle that is called the septum.

It provides the body with a constant flow of oxygenated blood by separating the left and right ventricles of the heart to prevent the oxygenated blood from mixing with the blood that has not yet been oxygenated.

It keeps the human body alive.

Sometimes, Molly wonders if something like the septum exists in the human mind, just to separate the reality from the expectation, like the heart's ventricles. If there is, she wonders if hers is broken.

Because for her, the line between reality and expectation has been blurred.

The next time she saw him, she'd already ended her engagement.

He came into the morgue with the Detective Inspector and John in his wake. Everything was the same. John and Lestrade, standing in the corner, waiting patiently for Sherlock's deduction while he darted about, examining the body she wheeled out for them. He was still as thin, but his eyes were bright at the idea of murder and his body bounced with energy.

It wasn't until he gestured for John to look at the fatal wound of the victim that she noticed the change.

They acted as usual, working around each other with the same effortless grace. But the signs were there, the lingering gaze and the faintest hint of a smile; the spark was there for everyone to see.

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.

"_Molly, I think I'm going to die."_

"_What do you need?"_

The Consulting Detective and his Doctor.

"_What do you need?"_

"_You."_

He didn't need her anymore. She would never matter to him the way John did. She knew it. She'd known it for years.

She just needed to finally accept it.

She stared at the wedding invitation in her hands, feeling numb and empty.

The heart might not be just a muscular organ, she thought. Because she felt an ache growing in her heart where there was no injury.

_The heart knows what the mind doesn't._

She didn't want to know.

She wanted to forget.

And for the first time since she'd met Sherlock Holmes, she cried.

The wedding was a small and intimate affair: only the grooms' family members and a few close friends were invited.

The ceremony was beautiful. She watched every smile, every touch, and every kiss they shared.

They were two halves of a whole. Looking at the men standing next to each other, it was hard to imagine that either of them being with anybody else.

Sometimes, she still wished that she could have her happy ending.

Sometimes, she wondered if there was an alternate universe where she and Sherlock were together.

It wasn't easy, because you can't just stop feeling by turning off your brain and shutting off your heart. But time passes, and people move on. She knew it might not be now, but it would hurt a little less in the future.

She didn't hate John, although she still harboured the feeling of jealousy towards him for having the one person she wanted the most.

But it was fading, and she knew with time, it would get better.

They were just never meant to be.

Sherlock asked her for a dance, and she said yes.

She was surprised when he leaned forward to whisper in her ear, his voice deep and warm.

"Thank you, Molly."

Three words. So much was said in three simple words, and she felt tears well up in her eyes. She pulled back to look at him, and a few tears escaped despite her efforts to keep them back. "What for?"

"For being there for me when I need you." His thumb smoothed gently over her cheeks, wiping away her tears. "For saving my life."

He leaned down to press a kiss to her cheek. "And for your love."

Her eyes widen, "You –"

"You are a brilliant woman, Molly Hooper. You are a dear friend, and you will always matter."

His hands tightened around her and there was affection in his normally cold eyes. Affection for her. Affection for a friend.

And they danced until the song finished.

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><p>Thank you for reading :)<p> 


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